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MATILDA MATTHEW. 



litoria delta Poetia Italiana, par Crescembini (3 

 vols.); Ttrabosc/ti Storia delta Poesia Italiana (3 

 vols.); Canzoni e Prosa Toscane (I vol.); Canzoni 

 Toscani (I vol.); and Delia Ragion Poetica di Gra- 

 tiita (1 vol.). He also edited (in 2 vols., 4 to) the 

 Works of Thomas Gray, with his Life and Additions, 

 published at the expense of the university of Cam- 

 bridge. 



MATILDA, marchioness of Tuscany, famous for 

 her connexion with Gregory VII., was a daughter of 

 Boniface, marquis of Tuscany. She was born in 

 1046, and married Godfrey the Hump-backed, son of 

 the duke of Lorraine, but always lived separate from 

 him, being unable to exchange the mild climate of 

 Italy for a northern sky. Being left a widow in her 

 thirtieth year, she engaged devotedly on the side of 

 Gregory VII. and Urban II., against the emperor 

 Henry IV., her cousin. She was almost the insepar- 

 able companion of Gregory, always ready to assist 

 him in every thing that he needed. This close con- 

 nexion gave rise to many unfavourable suggestions, 

 which were, however, groundless, although it is 

 certain that their friendship was founded not only on 

 policy, but also on mutual inclination and esteem. 

 Matilda had been accustomed by her mother, to see 

 in the pope a saint, while, at the same time, she 

 reverenced the saint as a father. Gregory had, 

 therefore, found much opportunity to influence the 

 formation of her character. Her mind, moreover, 

 was susceptible of a very high tension, and had been 

 disciplined to manly firmness. There are, therefore, 

 grounds enough for explaining how she should be 

 able to dare and do so much for Gregory. The 

 donation of all her goods and possessions to the 

 Roman church (in 1077 or 1079, for the original 

 "ecords are lost), was, probably, but the least sacri- 

 fice. The sharing with him every danger that she 

 could not avert, and her exhortations to him to 

 encounter that which was unavoidable with stead- 

 fastness and courage, show her energy and resigna- 

 tion. She alone stood by him against the emperor 

 in 1081, sustaining him with her treasures, while 

 Rome was besieged ; and, even after the death of 

 Gregory, she prosecuted open war against the em- 

 peror. She died at Polirone, in 1115, in the Bene- 

 dictine convent built by herself. Her death gave 

 rise to new feuds between the emperor and pope, 

 Pascal III., on account of the donation above- 

 mentioned. These feuds, finally, resulted in the 

 cession to the pope of a portion of the estates of 

 Matilda. They consisted of Tuscany, Mantua, Par- 

 ma, Reggio, Piacenza, Ferrara, Modena, a part of 

 Umbria, the duchy of Spoleto, Verona, and almost 

 all that constitutes the present patrimony of the 

 church, from Viterbo to Oviedo, together with a part 

 of the Mark of Ancona. See Popes, and Gregory 



MATSYS, QUINTIN; a painter, who was originally 

 a blacksmith, born at Antwerp, in 1460. Different 

 accounts are given of the occasion of his quitting the 

 forge for the pencil ; but most of his biographers 

 agree that it was in consequence of becoming enam- 

 oured of the daughter of a painter, whose hand was 

 to be obtained only by a master of the same profes- 

 sion. He chiefly painted portraits and half figures in 

 common life, but sometimes undertook great works, 

 of which a descent from the cross, in the cathedral of 

 Antwerp, is a favourable specimen. His picture of 

 the two misers, at Windsor, is also much admired. 

 He died in 1529. 



MATTER; that which occupies space, or that 

 which the human mind considers as the substratum 

 of bodies occupying space. As matter is perceived 

 by us only in as far as it affects us, we must consider 

 it as something effective in space, which, by its exten- 



sion and motion, operates according to laws. From 

 early times, the most various notions have hern 

 maintained of the essence of matter and the mode < f 

 its operation on the mind. In the most ancient times, 

 powers, not unlike the soul, were conceived to exist 

 in matter, by means of which it operated on mind. 

 Leucippus and Democritus considered the universo 

 as consisting of empty space and atoms, and explained 

 all living nature by the influence of external powers. 

 In later times, Descartes made a total difference be- 

 tween the material and the simple, or intellectual, 

 and conceived extension to be the only essential 

 property of matter. According to him, matter is not 

 simple, but composed of parts, which, in reality, are 

 indivisible atoms, but, in idea, are still divisible, and 

 have still extension. Newton, who did not enter 

 into metaphysical investigations on the subject, only 

 states that he considers matter as an aggregate of 

 the smallest parts, which again are material and 

 extended, and, by an unknown power, are strongly 

 connected with each other ; whence it follows, that 

 he also belongs to the atomists. The dualism of 

 Descartes involved the metaphysicians, on account of 

 the union of the spiritual with the material, in great 

 difficulties, and thus caused different metaphysical 

 systems. One of the most remarkable is the ideal 

 theory (q. v.), which absolutely denies the existence 

 of matter, and declares all our notions of material 

 tilings to be but ideas or images, which the Deity 

 implants in the soul of man; whereupon, Malebranche 

 founded the opinion, that we see all things in God, 

 and that we are authorized to deny the existence of 

 all things except God and the spirits in general. He 

 considers the effect of matter on our mind as an influ- 

 ence of God. Spinoza and Hume went still further 

 in the ideal theory. The former supposed a single 

 substance, whose properties are infinite power or 

 thought and extension, and explained all spiritual 

 and material phenomena as states of this one power 

 of thought and extension. Hume, who neither allows 

 substances, nor subjects, nor any independent beings, 

 considers all things, spiritual and material, as a series 

 of passing phenomena. Leibnitz, who felt how very 

 difficult it was to explain the influence of matter on the 

 mind by dualism, idealism, or materialism, proposed 

 the doctrine of monads, (q. v.) Priestley developed 

 further the opinion of Boscovich, that matter consists 

 merely of physical points, which attract and repel each 

 other, and said that matter is a mere attraction and 

 repulsion, which has a relation to certain mathematical 

 points in space. Notwithstanding the many systems 

 which have existed, matter is still the great riddle of 

 mankind. It will always be asked, If mind and 

 matter are essentially different, how could they pos- 

 sibly influence each other? and, on the other hand, 

 we cannot reason away the many phenomena which 

 indicate such a difference. In philosophy, matter is 

 also opposed to form. Material is that which belongs 

 to matter, as impenetrability, motion, extension, and 

 divisibility, and is opposed to spiritual. 



MATTHEW (called also Levi), an evangelist and 

 apostle, son of Alpheus ; previous to his call, was an 

 officer of the Roman customs, and, according to tra- 

 dition, a native of Nazareth. The accounts of las 

 life are imperfect and uncertain. Tradition repre- 

 sents him as having suffered martyrdom in Persia. 

 His Gospel has been supposed, by some critics, to 

 have been originally written in Hebrew, for the use 

 of converted Jews, about A. D. 60. If this is the 

 case, we have now only a Greek translation of it, 

 the original having been lost. His narration is not 

 according to the chronological order of events, and 

 in his report of the teachings of our Saviour, he ap- 

 pears to give them not precisely as they were 

 delivered, but to arrange and group them according 



